·Waihopai Spybase Protest Saturday January 28th

·Waihopai & the Gcsb Spy on Kiwis & Foreigners

·NSA Spies on Everyone

People from all around New Zealand (and Australia) will be converging on the super-secret Waihopai satellite interception spybase, in Marlborough, on Saturday January 28th.

We will be at the Waihopai spy base main gate at Waihopai Valley Road from 9.30 – 10.30 a.m. There will be speakers; information will be provided on the function of the base; and there will be a peaceful protest, calling for its closure.

The main focus of the day will be workshops in Blenheim both in the morning and afternoon. Featured speakers:

Former Green MP Keith Locke, jointly with Warren Thomson of the Anti-Bases Campaign (on Five Eyes/GCSB/Waihopai) – 11 a.m. - 12.30 p.m.

Nicky Hager (on researching skills) – 1.15 - 2.45 p.m.

Kyle Matthews, a Dunedin academic (on the history of non-violent direct action as a tactic, including during the nearly 30 years of the Waihopai campaign), along with Liz Remmerswaal Hughes (a Kiwi who was at the October 2016 protest activities at the very nasty US warfighting and spy base at Pine Gap in Australia). Adrian Leason, one of the three Waihopai Domebusters who deflated one of the spy base’s domes in 2008, will also speak at this workshop. 3 – 4.15 p.m.

The day of workshops will conclude with the first Blenheim screening of Errol Wright and Abi King-Jones’ excellent 2016 documentary “The 5thEye”. 5 p.m.

The venue for the workshops and film screening is the Nativity Centre, 76 Alfred St, central Blenheim.

The Anti-Bases Campaign is inviting the people of Blenheim to join us at the base protest, and to come to the workshops and film screening. To that end we are having an information leaflet (attached) delivered to every house in Blenheim (all 9,154 of them) this weekend.

2016 saw the Goverment change the law to remove previous restrictions on domestiv spying by the NZ Government Communications Security Bureau (GCSB, which operates Waihopai). Not only does the GCSB systematically spy on New Zealanders – but it also routinely spies on any number of other countries, on behalf of the US National Security Agency (NSA). And the NSA spies on everyone. It is essential that more pressure is put on the Government to end the anti-democratic and destructive activities of this NZ spy agency. For nearly 30 years Waihopai has been NZ’s most significant contribution to Washington’s global effort to manipulate world business and diplomacy.

Waihopai does not operate in the national interest of New Zealand. In all but name it is a foreign spy base on NZ soil, paid for with hundreds of millions of our tax dollars; it spies on Kiwis and foreigners; it is NZ’s key contribution to America’s global spying & war machine. Waihopai must be closed.

ends

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